So you’re asking yourself, well if I had an issue I wanted to be heard by those who are supposed to be representing me, how could I do that? Some of us would rather we not teach or speak to this (see here). As it turns out, my idea of “hey let’s learn and be involved” is actually more popular than I thought. Let’s hear more, but from someone else.

According to my new buddies at the Evergreen Freedom Foundation , you can be a a ten minute citizen. I kid you not. It’s as simple as finding a cause that really irks you, researching it and bugging your legislator incessantly about it.

A good example could be as follows: “Dear Jan: Stop the crusade to rename the Tacoma Narrows bridge. Do something cooler this year. Please.” But in saying that, referring to one Jan Angel who has yet to respond to anything I have to say, is she honestly listening or even caring what *this* constituent of hers has to say? How else can I reach the populace and raise questions and get people thinking and even, heaven forbid, involved in the process of Washington state? There’s tons of voices out there and mine is just one of them. I’ll say it one more time just in case you didn’t catch it the last eight million times I’ve said it.

Yes, I live in Kitsap County. Yes, I am a democrat. Do I always agree with and as I like to put it “maintain the party line at all costs”? No, but I know some who do and it sorta sickens me. Sometimes I like to be different or even be “me”? Isn’t there something out there that gives me “freedom of speech”?

Let’s revisit the Evergreen Freedom Foundation’s primer to being a citizen for ten minutes.
Okay, so you want me to be a ten minute citizen, and only address one issue? But what if my issue involves the present and future for not only my hometown, but my county and state as well? I don’t think I can spend just ten minutes a day on that. What if I don’t want to leave my children and everyone else’s children a legacy of crap? What if I’d prefer to leave them with the gift of knowledge and the idea of “you DO have a voice”? That’s MY peeve and I can tell you that it does not take ten minutes a day to do something about that. Matter of fact, that “peeve” I cited is something that most youth I’ve spoken with toss aside. WHY?

The word is called “apathy”. If you don’t like that word, go with “disenfranchisement”. One average “could be voter” upon finding out who I was, informed me that he refused to register or even vote. Sure, he had read my blog and got my argument. But his argument was, “Bremerton is caked with yard signs, some of them really HUGE, BLATANT and ANNOYING. That says to me that elected officials aren’t really concerned about being environmentally friendly and speaking to saving our planet, but rather to making it worse. Why would I even want to vote knowing that?” Good point. Very good point.

I again have to go back to the ten minute citizen entry. It’s chock full of such rich information I can’t contain myself. I like this “engage the media”. You know what, I’ve engaged the local media enough that my own hometown newspaper wouldn’t DREAM of publishing anything I’ve written. There’s a few different hometown publications who would throw any copy I submitted to the circular file located at the end of the desk. I will also admit that I have a bit of a problem with my written word being edited and construed in a manner different than I’d ever agree to, which can happen if you choose to submit a “letter to the editor”. The editor has the right to not only edit you, but edit for space and content.

Much of what said poster wrote for the Evergreen Freedom Foundation (and I have to say, I’ve given your group way too much publicity here. It stops after this post. Believe me, it does.) about becoming active is pretty dead on and straight forward. I don’t know that many of my friends would appreciate long winded emails about my “cause of the week”. Yes, I am a social networking junkie. No, it does not work to my advantage always. Yes, I’ve read through more Washington state legislative mumbo-jumbo than your average citizen/resident. I guess I take that time (again, more than ten minutes) because I have this motto I’m aiming to follow. Of all places, I learned it at this Girl Scout camp called Camp Robbinswold. That motto is “You always leave a place better than when you found it”. Sure, in some cases, I have not held true to that. But when it comes to my state I’m gonna do what I can to achieve just that. Not only for those kids who are eventually going to inherit it all, but because some of my relatives can be traced back to being residents here before Washington state ever attained statehood. May all their souls rest well knowing that I’m working on keeping Washington green, clean and pristine.

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Tags: Bremerton yard signs, democrat blogging in Kitsap, Evergreen Freedom Foundation, Jan Angel 26th district republican, Port Orchard media, voter apathy in WA, WA state democrats, WA state politics

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 9th, 2010 at 07:20:27 and is filed under daily dribble. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.